Gibbs could dig all he wanted, but for once, Green thought, time and patience might prove their greatest ally. For the first time since Twiggy died, despite this bewildering and unsettled end, he felt some hope that justice would have the final say.
He squeezed Gibbs’s shoulder. “Tomorrow, Bob. We’ve all had a rough week, but Sue’s had the worst. Why don’t you and Brian go tell her the news, and then take the rest of the day off.”
Gibbs looked at him. “Are you coming, sir?”
Green hesitated. He thought of the pale, wan figure surrounded by tubes, machines, and the smell of disinfectant and death. “Soon,” he said. “I just have to wrap up some paperwork.”
He walked back to his office and sat at his desk, staring at the blinking phone and the jumble of papers on his desk. He should write up the Hamm interview, he should check with Larocque about the Byward murders, he should update Devine . . .
He stared into space with Macdonald’s diary still in his hand, thinking about death, forgiveness, and the human soul.
About why Twiggy and MacDonald had been unable to make peace with their crimes, no matter how provoked and justified they seemed. And why Hamm had walked away from the calculated killing of two innocents with his conscience unscathed.
God, I’m getting too old for this, he thought. He set down the diary, left his phone messages and his memos unanswered, and headed off to see Peters.
September 10, 1995.
I haven’t looked at this diary in two years. Got home from Croatia, stuck it in the bottom drawer, and tried to forget about it. Just like I tried to forget about Croatia.
Dad’s really proud of my medal, and everybody down home wants to talk to me about it. But what the hell can I say? It’s a lie. I’m an imposter, and I can hardly stand to listen to praise of what I did, let alone talk about it. The army paraded me in front of the other units and the press, but the guys who really mattered—Blakeley, the Hammer—were never there.
So my medal sits with this diary in the bottom of the drawer, and I thought today would be a good day to look at them. Two years to the day since I rescued those Serbs. Almost two years since we beat the shit out of the Croats and moved into Medak, only to find they’d already destroyed the place. Three hundred Serbs killed without a trace.
Almost two years since I made those Croat soldiers pay the price. These past two years, I’ve hoped that maybe some good came of what we did. That maybe we’d helped them all feel more secure and find a better way to get along. Yesterday I read an article in the paper about Srebrenica, a village in Bosnia that the Serbs invaded while the Dutch UN peacekeepers stood by and watched. Over eight thousand Muslim boys and men have vanished without a trace.
Fuck it.
Barbara Fradkin was born in Montreal and obtained her PhD in psychology. Her work as a child psychologist has provided ample inspiration and insight for plotting murders.
Barbara has an affinity for the dark side, and her compelling short stories haunt several anthologies and magazines.
All of her novels feature the exasperating Ottawa Police Inspector Green, whose love of the hunt often interferes with family, friends and police protocol. The four other novels in the series are Do or Die (2000), Once Upon a Time (2002), Mist Walker (2003) and Fifth Son (2004). Once Upon a Time was shortlisted for Best Novel at the Arthur Ellis Awards, Canada’s most prestigious crime writing awards. Fifth Son and Honour Among Men both won the top prize, in 2005 and 2007.
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